In response to “What others say: ‘Alaska Agreement’ good theory, flawed practice,” (Clarion, June 17), it is certainly true that ‘Alaska’s Agreement’ is not going to fix the issue of campaign finance reform. Its hard to fix a broken system, since the outcome of Citizens United corporations have been allowed to spend unlimited amounts of money on campaigns. Campaign spending has reached an all time high, the top 32 Super PAC donors in the 2012 election gave as much as President Obama and Mitt Romney raised from all of their small donors combined — that’s at least 3.7 million people giving less than $200 whose voices were overpowered by just 32 megadonors.
Unaccountable special interest groups have had too much of an influence over our elections by virtue of the money that they can spend. Campaign finance reform is important, in order to restrict campaign spending in elections. As bad as the problem has been historically, the new rules post-Citizens United has only made things worse, with often-unknown spenders breaking records every election cycle — 2014 is expected to be no exception.
While winning a constitutional amendment to reclaim our democracy for ordinary citizens won’t be easy, it’s a fight worth having. And with 16 states and over 500 communities across the country already on record calling for an amendment, the momentum for victory is building. The Senate should answer to their constituents not to the Super PACs and megadonors.
